Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Hillary’s New Strategy To Steal The Nomination Emerging

The Democratic National Committee (DNC) needs to setup a fair, equal and transparent process to award the presently disenfranchised state delegates from Michigan and Florida before the national convention. Unless they do there are sure to be bitter allegations that the nomination has been stolen by the candidate that is not nominated.

The probability of arriving at the August convention in Denver with the nominee still undetermined due to a lack of enough delegates now seems plausible, 2025 are needed. The importance of the excluded delegates from Michigan and Florida therefore loom extremely large. Florida has 210 potential delegates and Michigan 156, and if they are reinstated they represent enough delegates to possibly tip the balance and determine the eventual nominee.

Hillary Clinton realizes this clearly as demonstrated by her recent overtures to get these banned delegates reinstated. The Obama camp has resisted the temptation to involve itself with these delegates and so far has pretty much played by the Party rules previously agreed to by all the candidates, including Clinton.

But true to the Clintons moral compass readings it is apparently acceptable to cheat if it means you’ll be victorious in the end. Party leaders must stop this apparent attempt to circumvent the rules that could lead to a stolen nomination.

Even though it is a violation of her pledge not to campaign in the states involved in the controversy she has been doing just that, and demonstrated by her efforts this week aimed at influencing the vote in Florida and her trips there where polls show she leads by a large margin. In fact she is planning a victory rally tomorrow in Florida.

In the Michigan primary held on January 18th Clinton received 55% percent of the vote and uncommitted received 40%. Obama was not on the ballot but the uncommitted vote maybe an indication of his voter support in Michigan. The most recent polls in Florida breakdown is Clinton at 50% Obama at 26%. Clinton almost daily pandering aimed at the voters in Florida may have raised her popularity there while Obama has been slow to develop a public strategy to deal with the problem.

This is why the DNC needs to act now to create a fair way to determine who will eventually be awarded these outlawed delegates before it actually becomes a potential black eye to the party by ending up in a bitter floor fight at the convention or worse.

Florida and Michigan will be important states in the fall general election. It will be crucial that the DNC not alienate the voters in these states further by not allowing for some sort of compromise over the participation of their delegates in the nominating process.

I suggest a round of caucuses in June or July be held where the candidates will have time to actually fully campaign beforehand. Then the delegates should be awarded based on the outcome.